~ The story of our adventures and discoveries travelling Europe

Week 9A – Karen’s Summary of Nimes

We drove to our apartment near Nimes, in a tiny village called Boissières. It was a quaint village and our apartment was in an idyllic setting – we went through a door off the road and there was a large garden which our apartment overlooked. There was wine, biscuits, gourmet olive oil and fancy soap for us to use, which made the place feel even more special.

Unfortunately we only had a couple of days in Nimes and we filled them up so we didn’t have any time to enjoy the garden. The kids tried the swimming pool but it was so cold that it was painful so they didn’t last long.

Our highlights were:

the house! (see Peters blog for more photos of the house).

Visiting a the Roman theatre in Orange. We listened to the audio which told us some interesting facts, and we watched some movies about shows that have been staged at the theatre over the years.

After Orange, we went to Pont du Gard (Roman Aqueduct).which was fantastic. First we had a picnic, complete with picnic basket then drove into the Pont du Gard parking area. It was fun to walk around, the aqueduct was impressive

Going though the Ludo and Aqueduct musuem – the kids loved the hands on displays of the Ludo, and the aqueduct had heaps of information about how it was built.

The next day we visited firstly a village on a hill, Gourdes. Lots of little lanes to walk around and great views, and TKD practice for Daniel and Dad..

After Gourdes we visited Roisseau, a town of colour! They extract ochre here which is used to make paint. All the houses were colourful – its classic Provence.

We walked around the National Park to see the hills from which the ochre comes – a nice walk down and steep walk back up.

On the way home we stopped at one place where Van Gogh had painted one of his orchard pictures. There was a whole self guided tour of sights where artists painted their famous pictures. If only we had more time..

We stopped at Les Baux and after Peter and Daniel battled the wind to check it out Amy and I ventured forth into the mini-gale. It was quite an experience – and definitely a place to come back to when there is better weather.

In fact, the whole area in and around Nimes is a place we’d like to go back to …